5/15/2025

Love is manifest by efforts calculated to stimulate, instigate, cause, or perpetuate goodness and improvement. 

We love others by making efforts calculated to stimulate, instigate, cause, or perpetuate goodness and improvement in their lives.

We receive the love of others by accepting, receiving, and increasing the goodness and improvement offered.

We love God by correctly appreciating him and valuing him

We love others by correctly appreciating them and valuing them.

To love someone or something is to correctly appreciate and value that thing.

God’s value is manifest by his love.

The love of God is manifest by the goodness and improvements he offers. We love him by accepting and incorporating the goodness and improvement he offers.

“If ye love me, keep my commandments.” (New Testament | John 14:15)

It is sad how so often God’s love is interpreted as mean, hateful, hurtful, and evil. God freely gives us teachings, commandments, correction, and chastening, yet how often do we despise and reject these things?

It is the way of the natural man, who is carnal, sensual, and devilish, to automatically reject and revile against teachings that somehow challenge or conflict with our current understanding. When we meet others who understand God’s teachings better than we do, and who say things that seem harsh, judgmental, hateful, and hurtful, do we consider the possibility that maybe these people have a deeper understanding and insight into these matters than we do, or do we hate their saying and reject them? Do we despise their teachings, correction, condemnation, and chastening because, in our foolishness, we consider them hateful, hurtful, and evil? So often the answer is, yes, we do. This is not good.

All goodness comes in and through Jesus.

There is only one hope, one joy, and one truth, and that’s Jesus. All goodness comes in and through Jesus. He is the way, the truth, and the life. Everything else, every sin, every transgression, and every misstep away from Him is the way of misery and needless pain. We’ve been given every motivation and every good reason not to sin. 

We sin when we reject his love. We sin when we do not love him or accept what he offers.

The way of truth and righteousness is a straight and narrow path marked by an iron rod, which is the word of God. We reject his love as we reject his word, which causes deviation away from that path.

We need to cease being snookered and deceived by this idea that all things from God will give us a nice, warm, gentle, lovey-dovey feeling. Being corrected and chastened is seldom a pleasant thing. Get used to it. Expect it. Be ready to have hard conversations that don’t feel good. Expect to be corrected, chastened, rebuked, and proven wrong about a great many things.

Those who cannot endure the fire of chastening cannot endure the eternal weight of glory that God offers.

Misunderstanding the love of God and how it operates is one of the most destructive stumbling blocks we face as would-be disciples of Christ.

So often, we do not know or love the Lord because he can’t get near us. This is because every time he tries to correct or chasten us, we throw a temper tantrum and send him packing.

One of the saddest things I see so very often is professing Christians who claim to know and love and serve the Lord, who systematically reject the Lord and his teaching and correction whenever they don’t like it. They think they know how God is, and so they systematically reject manifestations of his love that do not line up with their conceptions of how he is and how he operates.

“And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.” (New Testament | John 17:3)

When others come, in the name of Jesus Christ, with teaching and correction that we don’t like, and we in turn condemn them and reject them, we damn ourselves by rejecting the path that leads to him and leads to eternal life. This is undesirable.

May we all humble ourselves. May we all expect and receive the chastening he so lovingly offers us! This is my prayer, in his holy name, Amen.